


Paint My Sunset

by Candyblossom



Category: Naruto
Genre: Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Angst, Fix-It of Sorts, Gen, Hatake Kakashi is a Mess, Internal Monologue, M/M, Misunderstandings, Mutual Pining, One-Sided Attraction, Pre-Slash, Soulmates, and the other one is primarily posessed by an old dead guy and a plant, because one thinks the other one is dead, but we are getting there, hopefully you never know with Obito, not quite
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-07
Updated: 2019-12-07
Packaged: 2021-02-18 12:35:51
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,674
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21710851
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Candyblossom/pseuds/Candyblossom
Summary: Soulmate AU in which you cannot see a certain colour until your soulmate forms an emotional bond with you.  However, this colour disappears from your sight when the bond is cut. The only scenarios in which you would still be able to see the colour you gained is if your very soulmate is wearing the colour or if you reestablish the once broken bond.Deep down, Kakashi never was able to let Obito go when he died during the mission to destroy Kannabi bridge.  Turns out that "Tobi" has an interesting choice when it comes to his mask.NOTE! I edited it a little, so it now has a little less open ending!
Relationships: Hatake Kakashi & Uchiha Obito, Hatake Kakashi/Uchiha Obito
Comments: 19
Kudos: 302





	Paint My Sunset

Kakashi stood still, paralyzed next to Tenzou.

The figure in the Akatsuki cloak in front of them obnoxiously flailing around while dodging Naruto, Sakura and Sai's attacks.

His visible eye widened. He couldn't move, couldn't speak, all of his attention caught up by the figure a few feet away from him that didn't even bother to acknowledge him.

Kakashi felt like a deer caught in headlights as he watched this person dodge Tenzou's Makuton and Sakura's vicious blows as if it was nothing but a play to him. He phased through attacks when he couldn't be bothered to dodge them as if he was just showing them all neat party tricks.

Tobi, he had cheerfully introduced himself. Tobi, who wore a mask that covered all of his face except his right eye.

Tobi's mask was orange. He shifted his attention and was able to say, for the first time with the conviction that Naruto's Overall really was as hideous as Sasuke had moaned about since it was indeed bright orange as well. He hadn't seen orange in years, decades.

Not since Kannabi Bridge. Not since-

"GATSUGA!",Kiba yelled out and started his attack at the cloaked figure, ripping Kakashi away from his memories. Whoever this person was, now was not the time to dwell on it. He moved up his forehead protector to reveal his Sharingan.

He had to focus he had to help somehow, figure out where the bastard was phasing to when Sakura didn't hit her perfectly aimed punch.

But the orange of the goddamn mask was just too damn distracting. Naruto who flashed into his vision every few seconds didn't make it better either - it was a stimulation to his brain he wasn't used to and it was almost like the Sharingan made that feeling worse, with the pounding headache that had started slowly humming and building up in his skull as soon as they had entered the clearing.

What the hell was going on?!

He didn't need Hinata's Byakugan to figure out that, unlike the transportation Jutsu of his old Sensei, Tobi didn't vanish completely most of the time. Chunks of him just vanished out of existence whenever either of them tried to hit him.

The silver-haired man forced himself into motion when the Akatsuki member seemed distracted with Tenzuos wooden attacks.

He didn't have a plan, nothing concrete, he just had to get closer.

Meanwhile, Tobi had his fun appearing and disappearing literally everywhere seemingly just to annoy all of them.

Another thing Kakashi had noticed. He hadn't hurt any of them yet. All Tobi had done was dodging their attacks and the Jou-nin hated every damn second of it.

He steeled his resolve and approached the man from behind only to be not spared a glance and not even given an opportunity to attack since the masked Akatsuki member disappeared faster than Kakashi could even properly comprehend with his Sharingan.

The pounding emitted from the Sharingan got worse and he had to refrain himself from covering the thing up with his hand or clutch it shut.

"Sasuke won.", a monotone voice suddenly said and all of their heads turned up to the figure that appeared behind Tobi that seemed to be half...plant?

Tobi turned as well and Kakashi noticed a shift in the figure's body language. The man wasn't goofily slouching anymore but standing up straight, shoulders back, turning his head slightly to give the creature his attention.  
"Uchiha Itachi is dead.", it continued and Kakashi had to force himself to breathe.

"Whoa! That's unbelievable!", Tobi exclaimed all obnoxious flailing and loud again as if these short moments the Copyninja had sensed hadn't even existed. Kakashi focused on the man, all of his attention was focused on that orange mask and the right eye behind it.

"...Or not."

And suddenly he saw it. The red Iris, the three tomoes.  
That man had a Sharingan in his right eye socket.

Without really wanting to, Kakashi felt his feet moving, the crunching of the ground under him. He moved as fast as he could, not breaking eye contact with the figure, with that man that stood there glaring down on him.

"Farewell..."

Tobi said in a voice wasn't the shrill squeal the man had put on before but a deep rumble that filled Kakashi with another, deep sense of desperation. He reached out his arm and the Akatsuki figure began to disappear in a swirl of nothingness.  
He felt himself screaming, hoping he'd be able to be in time, just once in his life to be in time but to no avail. He stood there with nothing but air to grasp and a whisper in his mind.

"Kakashi."

He closed his eyes. trying to ignore the deep emptiness that suddenly filled him with the man's departure. He covered up his Sharingan again.

"Kakashi-Sensei? Are you alright?",Naruto's voice and hand on his shoulder made him turn around and look up at his younger student who mustered him with worried, big blue eyes.

"Yes, I'm okay.", He said, "that man has a Sharingan in his right eye."  
And just saying that made a lump in his throat appear that he tried to swallow quietly.

"I see.", Naruto said as he turned his gaze towards the forest they still had to conquer. Kakashi watched him. The boy had probably already forgotten what he had just said in order to mull over the fact that the plant-guy had just said that Sasuke really had killed Itachi. Or maybe the others hadn't even heard that. Kakashi was reading the lips of the creature more than listening to the words really but he did that automatically whenever he used the Sharingan.

Kakashi was utterly exhausted, his left eye burned and so did his right one as he realized that Naruto's damn overall really was orange and that that mysterious man that called himself "Tobi" must have been none other than Obito Uchiha.

Everyone was regrouping now and Tenzou eventually decided that it was time for a rest, since nightfall was approaching, before they would continue on with the mission. Kakashi didn't say anything throughout the ordeal, trying his very hardest not to either break down in either hysterical laughter or sobbing.

This had to be a sick joke. A sick disgusting joke that had to stop now.

They made a camp upon the thick branches of the forest. Sakura and Naruto close together as always, sleeping peacefully next to each other. The Kunoichi had an arm stretched out to his friend that was just grasping the Uzumaki's cloak, as to make sure that he wouldn't leave without her. Sai slept by himself, as he always did, curled up on himself next to Sakura, however. Kiba, Shino, and Hinata were all leaning against the same tree trunk, makeshift blankets made out of all of their jackets as they all huddled together. It was a sweet picture actually. The two boys on each side of Hinata as if the Hyuuga princess was in dire need of protection. Tenzou was taking watch in front of the campfire he had created with his wooded Jutsu and a small Katon-technique provided by Kakashi after having to ask his senpai multiple times to rip him away from his thoughts.

\---------------------------------------------------

Ever since that Akatsuki man, his ex- Commander had looked barely short of shell-shocked. He wasn't talking unless directly spoken to with a sense of urgency. For some reason, Kakashi's glance would also constantly swift to Naruto as if something would glue his eye to the young Jinchuuriki.

A sigh escaped the Makuton-user as he stared out into the dark night into which Kakashi had disappeared in, after being sure that all of the young ones had fallen asleep.

Tenzou hadn't said anything as Kakashi left. What was there to say?

He knew the silver-haired man for over a decade now. Kakashi wasn't someone you could just talk to. Especially if something bothered the older one. Tenzou assumed Kakashi would just put all of his fears, worries and feelings all in a big bottle and one day just die with it, closed and sealed so even after his death nobody would be able to peek inside.

Tenzou never got a look inside his Captain and he doubted that it would ever be the case.

So he let him go, hoping that Kakashi would try, just for once, to not be an utter idiot. What Tenzou did not know however was the fact that Kakashi was running. Running from the warm gleam that had made everything on the campsite shine in a soothing shade of orange.

It had been oddly poetic that, after the Kannabi Bridge, he wasn't able to look at sunsets any more, he started to forget what fire looked like, his book covers were suddenly absent of color just like a lot of parts of Konoha in general. Kakashi had been okay with that at the time because losing Obito, had felt as if something important had been ripped away from him. It felt as if something irreplaceable has been now gone from his life and he'd never find something to replace that presence with. He tried to see this loss as a lesson, a wake-up call to never ever leave his comrades in need behind.

Then, when he killed Rin, it hadn't felt like something inside of him had been taken. It didn't feel like someone had just taken a part away from his word. When Rin died, he died with her. He wished he did, at least. It felt like it.  
The look on Rin's normally so cheerful features had imprinted in his mind and to this day, decades later, he still woke up with tears in his eyes.

When he had felt her blood trailing down his fingers and had locked eyes with her usually warm hazelnut eyes that had looked at him with nothing but fear and horror as the life slowly seeped out of her, Kakashi knew that he must have died.

When he fell on the ground with his eyes closed, seeping into soothing unconsciousness, he had hoped that he would never have to wake again.

Now imagine his disappointment when he woke up and saw into Minato's devastated, blue eyes. When Minato hugged him tight but Kakashi couldn't feel the warmth of his body anymore. He couldn't hear a word his sensei said to him, everything was just white noise compared to Rin's broken whisper of his name that echoed continuously in his mind. 

Kakashi forced himself back into the present. Tried to control his breathing. Tried to control his emotions and the ache in both his Sharingan and heart ever since Obito had disappeared.

Obito.

Who he had thought was dead.

Who survived but never returned home.

Who was part of Akatsuki instead.

Who Kakashi was supposed to be enemies with.

Who Kakashi was supposed to kill.

Who was his Soulmate.

A wave of nausea overcame the Hatake and he stopped in his run, clumsily caught himself on a trunk and just managed to rip down his mask to vomit. Acid burned in his throat unpleasantly but at least he felt something after that numbness had overcome him as soon as they had built up camp. Ever since Kakashi had sat down, the man had just felt.. empty.

As if everything was pointless.

He wondered if that this was what Obito felt?

Kakashi knew that when they were kids, Obito's cheer had been a big part of being able to resurface after his father's suicide. When he had been at his lowest, there always had been that far off, a spark of joy in his mind, that only grew stronger the nearer he had been to the young Uchiha.

He knew that Obito's emotions always had quite an impact on Kakashi.

He wondered if it went the same way?

Probably not.

Obito might be Kakashi's soulmate.

But Kakashi knew that he was not his.

Kakashi knew that he couldn't be Obito's soulmate for one simple if heart-wrenching reason.

Kakashi had killed Obito's soulmate already.

He had never quite forgotten the panic he had felt followed by the deep disappointment in his heart when Obito had told him that Rin was the reason he could see the sky.

They had never really gotten to the topic of soulmates before, so when they finally did discuss it, while they had to keep watch during a mission, Kakashi had tried to muster up all the bravery he could possibly call upon.

Kakashi had been twelve at that time and they had been on an easy mission, without any big complications.

\---------------------------------------

"Obito.", Kakashi had said, quietly hushing as if he didn't know that Rin was too deep asleep to hear him no matter at what volume he spoke.

"What is it, Bakashi?", the black-haired boy had replied in the same hushed whisper and turned to the smaller Chu-Nin. Kakashi mustered his bright orange goggles and the soft gleam to his skin created by the fire and thought, once again that orange really did suit Obito. He took a second to reply, inhaling deeply, as if to summon back the bravery that had fled him the second the Uchiha had turned around to face him.

"Uhm, what do you think of soulmates?", he asked not able to meet the other boy's gaze anymore.  
Obito spluttered.

"Soulmates?! Why are you asking?", the boy asked, suddenly interested but not in a loud and booming voice, but curiously hushing all of the sudden. Which was unexpected, Kakashi had to admit, but not unappreciated.

"Mah, just cause. Have you found yours already?", The Hatake boy deflected, now looking up at the taller boy again with two curious black eyes.

"Ah, well. Yes, actually.", the boy admitted and a bright blush crept up his face. Cute, Kakashi found himself thinking and perhaps even blushing a bit himself.

That blush had fled his face however when he noticed that Obito's gaze has shifted and that he was looking intently at Rin with a dreamy look on his face.  
If Kakashi didn't know better Obito could be drooling.  
It had felt like something shattered in Kakashi's heart and a lump built in his throat. No, it couldn't be!

"It's Rin? She's your soulmate?", he had asked, trying to use the curious tone to hide his deep disappointment as he turned his head as well, watching the sleeping Rin, who had turned her back towards them but was breathing calmly and steadily. Kakashi refused to look at Obito as he studied his sleeping teammate.  
"Yeah, the bond didn't form for a really long time though, but that made it so much better.", Kakashi could hear the grin in Obito's words and his heart sunk a little lower as his eyes started to burn.  
"Rin, you know,", he said dreamily before losing himself in his excitement, "She showed me the sky! I had never seen blue before! I was so blown away! Can you see blue, Bakashi?"

Kakashi managed a faint nod.  
"Ahh, you're so lucky to always be able to see it! The sea too! Both look so pure and calm!"  
Kakashi could hear Obito shifting, probably shifting his weight, sprawling his legs - a childish gesture that Kakashi would have found both obnoxious but also endearing. 

But he refused to look. 

Because if he was, he would have to look at Obito's orange goggles again and he wasn't sure if he would have been able to hold in the tears in then. It was stupid that he was getting this worked up about this. Shinobi didn't cry! They didn't show feelings! But he just couldn't help it! Which made him even more upset.

Kakashi hated having feelings.

"Don't tell her though, please! It must be a secret between men!", Obito suddenly exclaimed. "Just because she is my soulmate doesn't mean that I am hers!", he said and Kakashi had to force himself to not let out a dry laugh at that. Yeah. Tell him about it.

"I want to tell her after everything's over...", The Uchiha said, returning to a soft and almost longing tone, that made Kakashi turn back towards his teammate again, despite his better judgment.  
Obito sat there, just next to him, orange goggles on, glazed in orange light as he stared up into the stars. When he saw him turn, Obito lowered his head so that they locked eyes. Unconsciously, Kakashi balled up the hand that was invisible to Obito's eye.  
"I want to tell her after the war.", Obito smiled at him and if Kakashi pretended very hard he could imagine that these words were directed at him instead of the girl that slept next to them.  
"I want to tell her when there's peace and we don't have to worry about going on dangerous missions anymore, so Bakashi if you tell her before that, I will totally kick your ass!", he pointed at him in his challenging manner, with a bright grin and fire in his eyes and if Kakashi's heart had been broken before he felt it shatter into a million pieces right then and there.

A shinobi doesn't cry.

A shinobi doesn't cry.

A shinobi doesn't cry.

Kakashi looked blankly at Obito before rolling his eyes.  
"Mah, I don't care to tell anyone your sap story, you cry baby.", he said in his drawled, cold tone. Obito, as expected, got riled up and the quiet, peaceful moment was broken as Obito started to throw hissed insult his way, that Kakashi answered with even harsher ones, before the boys returned - simultaneously - to angry, tense silence. If they were to broke into a physical fight, Minato-Sensei would give them hell.

It was better this way, Kakashi knew. The Uchiha was so utterly in love with Rin, that Kakashi stopped even feeling the need to confess to Obito. It was unnecessary after all. Obito seemed to like girls, moreover, he seemed to love Rin.  
Sweet, kind and caring Rin, who was the complete opposite of Kakashi.

Rin, who showed Obito the vast, blue sky.

Rin, who was Obito's soulmate.

His back was turned to the other boy and he quietly clutched a space over his chest, where his heart is.  
It hurt.  
But that was okay.

A shinobi is supposed to endure.

And eventually, as it always does, daybreak came. They all gathered their supplies to go on the final stretch to return to Konoha. And if Kakashi was even more quiet than usual, nobody noticed.

\------------------------------

Now Kakashi stood alone, surrounded by the quiet, dark night that smelled of nothing but forest and nature and peace and he was never so happy to not see something that's orange.  
But despite that, the rearing thoughts that had pulled him away from the campfire hadn't quietened. So he tried to calm them down by repeating things he was sure he knew about the person he had assumed to see in the Akatsuki cloak.

Obito is dead.

Obito died almost twenty years ago.

Obito died and gave you his Sharingan.

He tried to keep these truths in his brain, make them repeat on a loop in hopes that eventually, he could just go back to believing them.  
His Sharingan still ached since they encountered Tobi on the clearing. As if he had been overusing his Mangekyou, his left eye burned unpleasantly and penetratingly, despite the fact that Kakashi had not used the Mangekyou in quite some time and hadn't exhausted his Chakra resources either.

Obito is dead.

The thought in itself was ridiculous but it felt as if the Sharingan in his left eye was calling out to its counterpart. To his counterpart.

Kakashi sank down onto the branch he was standing on, a thick tree trunk pressed against his back. His left hand instinctively went up to cover his eye as if he had left it uncovered.He hoped that the warmth of his palm would soothe the pain. It didn't.

"Obito is dead, it couldn't be him.", he said out loud into the empty forest.  
He hoped that hearing himself say this, would make it more real, would erase the feeling in his chest that the bond between them hadn't tied itself together again.  
If he would allow himself to be honest with himself, he would come to the conclusion that after all the things he has experienced just alone in the short amount of time since he has become a Jou-nin teacher to the now-former Team 7, he would realize that the idea as itself would not be entirely impossible. That Obito somehow didn't die while in that cave.

But if that really was him, why was he wearing Akatsuki robes?

The idea that Obito, of all people, would betray Konoha to become a Missing-Nin just seemed way too surreal in his eyes. If Obito did survive why didn't he come home?

It's impossible.

He's dead.

He had to be.

He squeezed his eyes shut due to the pounding in his head. The pain pulsated violently in his skull. If felt like his head was about to burst. The whirring thoughts in his head apparently only added to the experience.

He let out a small hiss from the pain, but forced himself to otherwise stay quiet.

Kakashi was familiar with the Sharingan sporadically hurting for extended periods of time. According to Tsunade, it was natural that the powerful Uchiha Kekkei Genkai and his white Hatake Chakra didn't really go along well. It was a fight his body and Chakra would start in order to get the Chakra stealing pest, in this case, his Sharingan, out of his system.  
Normally these pains were quite simply soothed by a medical jutsu that was capable of calming the Chakra streams in his body down to flow steadily once more.

Given Kakashi's current state, however, the Copy-nin doubted he would be able to get back to his team's camp right now to ask for Sakura's help without putting himself through unnecessary torture.

He had ridden these pains out before. A few hours rest were much likely to fix most of it. At least enough to get up and moving again.

Therefore, even if he hates the fact to let himself stay out in the open so vulnerable, he tried to make himself as comfortable as he could on the wooden branch he was still sitting on. Normally in a situation like this, he would at least summon Pakkun to keep watch but he knew that if he'd summon the pug, the nosy little dog would want to know why he even was out in the woods by himself away from the others looking not only hurt but also visibly upset.

And if there was one thing Kakashi was as of right now even less up to than standing up, it was talking about how he felt.

So the Shinobi tried to rest up as best as he could despite the pain. He closed his eyes and tried to let himself drift away, if only for a bit. 

"Kakashi-sensei, are you alright?", he heard a hushed female voice, when he glimmered back into consciousness. 

When he opened his singular black eye, he found himself lying his back against a tree-trunk. 

Back at the campsite. But why? How did he get here? The last thing he remembered was closing his eyes in the woods, he hadn't even noticed that he had fallen asleep. 

And Hinata Hyuuga looked him, the only one awake between a snoring Kiba and an utterly silent Shino. When Kakashi looked around he found that everyone else was asleep too. Sakura, Naruto, Sai even Tenzou, who snoozed away quietly in a similar position Kakashi has woken up in, upper body against a tree trunk, as if he had just dimmed away during his watch.

Kakashi focused his gaze on Tenzou for a moment longer. As an ANBU under his command, Kakashi knew that if the younger one committed himself to stay awake for the night to keep watch, he would do so, despite any form of injury he had endured during a mission. His sleeping position was off too. Tenzou tended to curl up on grass or earth, he hated to sleep with his back pressed against anything.

This was definitely odd. His headache was gone too.

"Kakashi-sensei?", He heard Hinata again and he only now shifted his attention back to the Hyuuga princess.  
"Hinata, what's the matter? Did I do something to wake you?", he asked and tilted his head.

Kakashi could see that the question made the young woman shift consciously. Kurenai had always told him about how shy Hinata still was if she wasn't with Shino or Kiba. 

"Uhm well,", she started, "I think I sensed a disruption just a bit ago and it woke me up. When I used my Byakugan to check, I noticed that both yours and Yamato-sensei's chakra wasn't flowing naturally. Sometimes shinobi use sleeping aids to help them rest up during breaks and, well, Yamato-sensei's chakra seemed to resemble the same pattern. With you, however, I didn't know, so I wanted to check. I- I am sorry if it isn't my place to ask, Sensei!", she said and with the way she blushed, embarrassed that she might have done something wrong, Kakashi was wondering how both of her teammates peacefully slept through the commotion without so much as a twitch.

Kakashi did his best to smile at the young Kunoichi and ease her worry that way. "I am proud of you, that you noticed, Hinata. Your sensibility for detecting chakra disruption has increased immensely.", he said because young, aspiring kids needed praise sometimes, right?

When Hinata smiled shyly and mumbled a quiet but very appreciative "thank you", he continued

"And to ease your worries, everything is fine. Ten- ah, Yamato always has had trouble sleeping for as long as I've known him, so he sometimes takes a sleeping aid if he can't be helped.", he explained as if any of it had been true before he decided to use some honesty for his own explanation. "For me, I can only say that my Sharingan doesn't much agree with my Chakra sometimes, so it comes to slight disturbances every now and again but I barely feel it. If it gets any worse, Sakura can fix it with a simple Jutsu."

"Oh, I understand. Thank you for explaining and, ehm, easing my worries, Kakashi-sensei."  
she said smiling at him and as far as Kakashi was able to tell, she genuinely seemed relieved as she nestled back into Kiba and Shino as if she was a Puzzle piece that went back into its destined place. 

"No Problem, Hinata. Rest well."

He got a quiet hum in response. The young Hyuuga closed her eyes and Kakashi could tell that it only took her a few minutes to drift back into sleep.

Kakashi stood up silently, the second he was sure that she wouldn't stir and took the few steps to make it to the tree that Tenzou was leaning against, sleeping.

The Hatake crouched next to his former student and put a hand on his shoulder before forming a hand sign with the other.

"Kai."

The Genjutsu now broken, Tenzou's eyes snapped open with a start as he took a few moments to orient himself before he met eyes with his senpai. 

\----------------------------------------------------------------

Sometimes Obito hated the fact that he had given Kakashi his Sharingan. When he had given him his eye it was to see with him into the future, be a sort of guarding angel that always sticks to his side and helps him in every fight Kakashi would have to face.  
When the boulder had crashed on him and he was stuck in that cave with Rin and Kakashi, he knew that he couldn't leave them alone like this. 

He let Rin transplant his eye into Kakashi's left eye socket. Of course, he didn't hear a single sound of the Hatake prodigy during the entire ordeal.  
When Rin had asked him to look in a certain direction she could hear her voice coming out shakily, a faint sob echoed in his mind when she took the Sharingan from him.  
He had never wanted to hear Rin sob ever again, he wanted to make sure that Kakashi would do just that. 

He trusted Kakashi. Completely. He knew that if someone was able to protect Rin, it must have been him. 

Now Rin was dead and he stopped caring about this hellish world they were all trapped in.

Rin had been everything he had loved about this world. That it just so happened that they were soulmates was nothing but fate. That the very same fate had torn them both apart in the cruelest way possible was the representation of everything he now hated about this world.

Obito had developed a thick coat of apathy when the color of blue had faded from his view. When he looked at the sky and only saw gray, he knew that he had to burn it all to the ground.

Mayhaps that was the reason why he returned to Ame this often, where he could pretend that the penetrating blue of the sky didn't even exist.

He hated Kakashi, despite that he knew what had really happened in Kiri. He hated that Kakashi wasn't able to keep the promise that Rin herself made him break it. He hated Kakashi for the flowers he left at her grave, hated him for the hours he spent at the memorial talking to him as if Obito was there.

He hated Kakashi because no matter how pathetic this last tie to reality was, he couldn't bring himself to kill him. He couldn't completely succumb to the dream because Kakashi was still there, that's what the black Zetsu told him.  
And this fact invokes even more hatred, this time for Obito himself, because he was able to kill Minato-sensei and Kushina-san.

He hated Kakashi because he wanted to shelter him in the Tsukuyomi but was ultimately the reason he didn't want it to happen.

He gave Kakashi his Sharingan to see with him into the future. A future he now didn't want to know anything of. For him, it felt like a one-sided, permanent connection. Whenever Kakashi would use his Sharingan, Obito would get flashes of it. 

When he stood on that branch, just a few hours earlier, looking down at his old teammate and his students, a vision from Kakashi had come back to memory that had spiked something in his heart that he had believed killed by that same person years ago.

"Obito. Can you see them? They are just like us.", he heard the familiar voice and saw flashes of a training ground, where three young Ge-nin kids bickered with each other. Had Kakashi really just uncovered his eye to show him this? "Should I really pass them? What if I fail them too?"

Obito had been mad then when he heard those words echo in his mind. And on that clearing, he felt that same anger pulsate through him again. When he stood and looked down on them all and Kakashi looked at him as if he was able to see right through his mask, that was hiding that beneath all of the crimes he had committed as Madara, Obito still had lingering doubts.

Doubts who were staring right at him.

Doubts that Obito, now that Kakashi had actually seen him, looked at him with the eye that was once his, were clawing into him. 

He followed Zetsu, when he told him that Sasuke had killed Itachi. Just to see for himself. 

But Kakashi just didn't leave his mind, no matter what.

So despite his better judgment, he gave into this irrelevant urge to check on the Copy Ninja. 

Obito found Kakashi curled up, not quite asleep, in the middle of the goddamn forest, clutching his Sharingan, taking shallow breathes as if he was in pain. The sight invokes pity in him.

That's the reason.

That's why he put him under a Genjutsu and brought him back to his dumb little students.

That's it. pity.

\---------------------

"Kakashi-sensei is so quiet, don't you think?", Sakura said, coming up next to Naruto and keeping his fast pace.  
"Huh? You think so?", the blond answered brows furrowed in confusion. He didn't notice anything, "He's always quiet, isn't he?"  
"Not like this.", Sakura said though she wasn't sure how to explain it properly. Ever since they've woken up, something about their sensei had been off in a way. The lazy slouch he was usually sporting outside of a fight was missing, he hadn't read his Icha-Icha stuff when she woke up either.

When Sakura came to in the morning and opened her green eyes the sun was rising slowly, coating the site in a soft orange. The fire was slowly glimmering out of existence.  
She sat up on the floor, noticing that she was still holding onto Naruto's cloak but somehow couldn't really bring herself to let go.  
Now, that they were looking for Sasuke, an idiotic fear had sparked in the back of her head that Naruto just might leave her too. It prevented her from uncurling her gloved hand from the fabric of his teammate.  
When she looked around the campsite, she was confused that Kakashi-sensei didn't sit at the spot he had sat at when she had fallen asleep. Glancing about, she was able to see everyone, except for his sensei. 

"Yamato-sensei, where is Kakashi-sensei?", she said her voice still a bit hoarse from sleep as she rubbed her eyes with her free hand. 

Her Brunette Sensei sat where he kept watch the entire night, arm propped on his knee, back against the tree a slight frown on the normally calm face. When he heard Sakura's voice he turned around to look at her, erasing the disdaining expression from his face to replace it with a neutral one.

"Ah, good morning Sakura. Kakashi is just checking the perimeter. He'll be back when everyone has woken up so we can get moving.", he explained and moved his gaze up to the crowns of the trees in which Sakura assumed her Sensei must be perching on.

"Did something happen? He usually isn't that on guard.", Sakura noted and clutched the fabric in her fist a little tighter.

"We ran into a member of a terroristic group just yesterday. I think that calls for caution." Yamato answered and it was a sound and reasonable explanation but it just didn't really fit Kakashi to be the one doing it.

Sakura let the topic go, thinking that she is just fretting over nothing but when everyone woke up, and Kakashi immediately, on time, appeared on a branch near her with a short "Good morning everyone, let's get a move on." which was considerably lacking the carefree cheerfulness, the worry in the Kunoichi grew. 

"He's probably just worried about Sasuke.", Naruto considers and his tone got a note more serious. It always did when Sasuke's name was mentioned. 

"Yeah, probably...", Sakura said, yet it didn't explain why Kakashi-sensei hadn't looked at her or Naruto the entire day and kept his already fast pace a little faster than he usually did. 

\-------------------------

Ever since waking up back at the campfire, Kakashi hadn't been able to catch any shut-eye. Not only did his once Ge-nin student in which he saw so much of himself kill his brother and finally got the revenge that Kakashi had prayed for him not to seek, his soulmate was also a part of Akatsuki that was hunting down Jinchurikii, like Naruto. 

Fucking Uchihas.

But waking up back at the campsite, that really did mean that Obito was still alive and Kakashi had no idea how to feel about it. He only knew that whatever Chaos that has been going on in his head was starting to wear him out.  
He wished everything could just be normal and easy for once.  
But life and fate had this funny habit of messing up every order Kakashi was trying to integrate into his life.

They were all hurrying to the Akatsuki hideout, in hopes to find any traces of Sasuke there and while Kakashi hoped that there was still a chance at mending the broken, he already had a feeling that if the younger Uchiha managed to kill his older brother, he would not have left any traces of them both. 

He felt worrying glances pierce the back of his skull ever since they all had woken up, exception made for Tenzou who had looked at him worriedly throughout the entire night.  
He increased his pace as if he could flee them, faster towards a hint at Sasuke.

And maybe a little faster towards Obito. 

\--------------------------------

With a disdainful sigh, Obito turned away from the close-to-blind Orphan that was still resting unconscious. Of course, Itachi let his younger brother win. He didn't spare Sasuke just to kill him now to save his own life.  
Itachi always had that quiet matyrism sticking to everything he did and that's what he never liked about the younger Uchiha. It reminded him too much of himself. 

The cave they were hiding in, was far away enough that neither an Inuzuka nor a Hyuuga could smell or see them. It was a small, cold thing that was coated by a fragile silence. Only broken by Sasuke's labored breathing.

After Obito's little detour to Kakashi's team, he had forced himself to stick with the youngest remaining member of their clan. He had forced himself to sit quietly on the wooden crate in this cave that didn't have enough room to breathe and he forced himself to stay.  
Madara didn't care about small caves. Madara didn't care whether or not he couldn't properly stand upright and breathe deeply in and out. 

But Madara felt his facade cracking with every hour he had to sit in suffocating silence and Obito underneath was slowly but steadily breaking through.

Because Obito hated caves. 

If this had happened just a week before, before this damned clearing, he was sure he wouldn't have a problem sitting in this dark, cold hole for days without an end but right now all Obito wanted was to see the sky. No matter if it was dull and gray. Everything was better than the illuminated rocks he was buried under. 

So he stood up from his seat and left the cave and it felt like a defeat and victory at the same time.

His steps slowly carried him out. Suddenly paranoid to use the Kamui as if Kakashi would be able to sense it. Which he wouldn't be. Obito knew. But he still couldn't bring himself to it. 

Instinctually he looked down at the ground when he exited the cave, rather looking at the green grass than at the gray sky. 

He closed his eye. breathed in the fresh air as deeply as he could and couldn't quite stop the corners of his mouth from turning slightly upwards, now that he was free from the claustrophobia induced by the small confinement. 

Winter was slowly approaching. While the leaves were still green, the winds picked up and became a few degrees colder, the villages needed a bit longer to wake up, the days got a little bit shorter. 

A breeze was brushing over his mask and Obito lifted it off to feel it.

He hadn't wanted to feel anything in a long time.

But the urge seemed important, so he grasped at the orange porcelain and let the breeze wash over his hair, his face, his skin and gave it a small appreciative smile.

In this quiet, peaceful moment, Obito's mind felt empty. Empty of Madara, empty of hate, empty of regret and ambition, empty of longing and resentment. 

He breathed out, let his head fall back and opened his red eye that widened immediately at seeing the vast blue sky for the first time in over fifteen years.

**Author's Note:**

> Hey everyone! This was my first fanfiction on AO3 and I hope you liked it! If you see any mistakes, please let me know! Thank you so much for reading <3


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